Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2001 12:10:40 -0600 From: Brett Glass <brett@lariat.org> To: Trevor Johnson <trevor@jpj.net> Cc: Rahul Siddharthan <rsidd@physics.iisc.ernet.in>, <freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: Stallman now claims authorship of Linux Message-ID: <4.3.2.7.2.20010419120602.043f14b0@localhost> In-Reply-To: <20010419051419.Z5664-100000@blues.jpj.net> References: <4.3.2.7.2.20010418213837.00bcb100@localhost>
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At 04:37 AM 4/19/2001, Trevor Johnson wrote: >> Not true. Cygnus was only marginally profitable until it began to >> sell packaged software, much of it licensed under licenses other than the >> GPL (e.g. the eCOS license, which does not contain the GPL's "poison pill"). > >If by "poison pill" you mean the requirement to provide sources to those >to whom you distribute binaries, you're wrong. See section 3.2 of >http://sources.redhat.com/ecos/license.html . I've read the eCOS license carefully. It does not require you to distribute the source for drivers, etc. which you link into Cygnus' product. The GPL does. >A box of plastic disks? A box of packaged, conventionally licensed software. >The Red Hat stock for which the company was sold was worth $674 million at >the time (about $75 million now). That's right: the stock was inflated by a stock market mania which has not yet fully self-corrected. Red Hat was spending its stockholders' money -- and paid too much for Cygnus. >What's unethical about it? It is unethical to use the GPL on one's software or to promote its use or proliferation. The reason for this is simple: the GPL is designed to hurt people who have done nothing wrong. The first principle of any code of ethics is, and must be, "do no harm." The GPL, and its malicious intent, clearly violate that principle. >If the GPL didn't exist, people would choose, or make up, >something else that likely would not suit you either. They'd likely use the MIT X license or BSD license. --Brett Glass To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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